City Hall's fees for developing new private sector infrastructure is increasing by 10 per cent virtually immediately.
Council this week approved the decision to hike development transaction costs, and bigger hikes are expected in the year ahead.
But the issue did not pass without some second-guessing.
"I am concerned there has been no increase since 2004 and then we hit them [developers] with 10 per cent now," said councillor Brian Skakun during Monday's council meeting.
"Is there a way we could have a gradual annual increase rather than nail developers all at once?"
Councillor Murry Krause, chair of the Finance and Audit Committee, said this issue would be in the mix during the upcoming municipal budget was discussions.
Senior staff said Prince George is still on the low side for fees for such items as liquor license applications ($1,100 to apply for a new one, $550 to change an existing one), rezoning (from $220 to 1,100), construction permits (starting at $220) and public hearing notices ($330 to $550).
"We are at median or below median with similar communities and this doesn't change that," said Grant Bain, director of Planning and Development.
The increase actually doesn't make up for the shortfall over the past seven years due to inflation, according to the report from Nelson Wight, manager of Current Planning and Development.
The report was written with the help of Neilson-Welch Consulting Inc., a company hired to review the planning application fee structure, during which 10 other communities were compared to Prince George.
"For most types of applications, Prince George's total fees are typically in the lower end of the range of fees charged by the comparison group," said Wight. "For rezoning, development permit and development variance permit applications, Prince George's application fees are below the median fee and are three times lower than the municipalities at the high end of the scale which typically include Port Coquitlam, Maple Ridge and New Westminster."
Wight said the 10 per cent increase was a starting point, just to close the inflation gap that has grown since 2004, but more measures should be considered to increase the fees charged to Prince George developers.
His report had seven main recommendations:
- establish cost-recovery targets
- initiate interim fee increases to maintain current cost-recovery levels
- introduce a combined public hearing and public notification fee
- introduce a simple refund policy
- increase the scaled portion of current planning application fees
- evaluate the costs and benefits of the development review process
- transfer costs and charges paid to outside agencies
The B.C. Local Government Act has provisions that pertain to development fees municipalities can charge. Any changes in Prince George would have to comply with this legislation.
